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BOXING; For Tyson, A Setback For Bout In Britain

Immigration officials in Britain announced today that the boxer Mike Tyson could be refused entry to the country for a bout later this month because of his criminal record.

Tyson is scheduled to fight Julius Francis, the heavyweight champion of Britain, on Jan. 29 in Manchester. But immigration officials said that Tyson's coming here would violate rules prohibiting entry into Britain of anyone convicted of an offense carrying a sentence of 12 months or more.

Tyson was sentenced to six years in 1992 for raping Desiree Washington in Indianapolis. He served half the sentence. This past spring, he also served three and a half months of a one-year sentence after his no-contest plea to misdemeanor assault charges stemming from a minor traffic accident in Gaithersburg, Md., in 1998.

The Home Office, the British cabinet agency that controls immigration, said Tyson had no right of appeal of the restriction but that his backers would be given the chance to argue the case to let the boxer in.

They will have to prove ''strong compassionate reasons'' about why the rules governing normal foreign citizens with criminal records should be waived, a Home Office spokesman said. Britain is a country with a tradition of strict immigration policies, and several politicians here were outspoken in their support of the restrictions facing Tyson.

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The fight's promoter, Frank Warren, pledged to get Tyson in England for the bout. He also criticized the timing of the immigration officials' position.

''I'm disgusted that no one had the courtesy to pick up the phone and tell me about this problem,'' Warren said. ''It's not as if we put this fight on last week; we did this back in the first week in December.''

Tyson was scheduled to fly to England on Sunday.

Warren said that almost all the 22,000 tickets for the fight at the MEN arena were sold and that hotels in Manchester were already heavily booked in conjunction with the fight.

Usually, American boxers would not need either a visa or a work permit to come into Britain for a fight.

''I have never had a problem like this before,'' Warren said. ''We have done everything as we have done for any boxer. We have gone through the normal formalities of bringing a boxer into the country.''

But the spokesman for the Home Office said that no one involved in the boxing match had taken any steps before today to get in touch with the agency.

Frank Maloney, the manager for Francis (21-7), complained that officials barring Tyson's entry into Britain ''would be denying a young British fighter the opportunity of a lifetime, which he's worked very hard for.''

Francis is reportedly getting $528,000 for the fight while Tyson is expected to get $12 million.

Maloney said Tyson had served his time and ''he should be allowed to get on with his life now.'' Warren said Tyson should be allowed to come here, train for the match, fight and depart.

''He's not here to do anything else,'' Warren said, ''and he's not going to be a danger to anyone apart from the man he's going to fight in the ring.''